Studs Up – GW21

I wonder how many asses Sanchez saved last night?!? He sure as hell saved mine! This week we’re going a little rogue and concentrating on the new managers and how they have fared so far… Getting an early indication of their fantasy relevance is vital to getting ahead.

Gaffer Pardew. One of the first things that a new gaffer does is look for an increase in effort. The key metric for that, is tackles… Mr Pardew managed to do that well with a huge 31 tackles made (compared to an average of 17 over their previous 3 home games). You could say the lads have responded… Their time in possession is still very low for a home team at 43%, and was actually lower than their recent games, but what they are doing when they have the ball has been tweaked. They’re keeping the ball down and spreading the play across the whole pitch now as opposed to a very heavy bias for wing play previously. A great example was the home game against Stoke saw only 18% of play through the middle with 47% down the left. Another was against Southampton with 25% middle and 44% right. You could say these were horses for courses tactics, or maybe responsive tactics to a way the game is being playing out. Either way there has been a shift with the Tottenham game seeing a more even spread of 32%, 31% and 36% left to right… What that will produce or if it will be ongoing is yet to be seen in such a small sample size. It does provide a strong indication of a desire to better control the whole pitch as opposed to the wings, which can be much easier to defend against. Another metric that does need time is where they are having their shots on goal. Approximately 46% of shots over their previous 3 home games were from inside the box. This week saw several more attempts on goal than those games, and 72% were in the box! Of all the metrics we can access, this is the most important indicator as to tactical mindset in my opinion. Overall, it does feel more like the Pardew style of play that we saw at Newcastle. Effort and working the ball into the box from across the pitch… If this plays out and Pardew does try to recreate aspects of Newcastle, then you can expect the occasional clean sheet but not enough to be fantasy relevant. In attack, you could easily assume better chances and more goals by their strikers. Who that may be is hard to pick because they have Murray, Gayle and Campbell with none having played regularly this season, and Chamakh who is just horrid. Keep an eye on who Pardew fancies…

Gaffer Pulis. We all know how this is going to go… Defence; tighten up through better team structures and clear responsibilities. Make it simple. You get a feeling some managers try to complicate things too much. Pulis doesn’t, he has some tried and trusted methods which he’ll use and succeed at. Attack will be fast and direct to strikers running the channels. They’ll look for 1-0 wins and guess what? That’s exactly what they got in his first EPL game in charge. The great thing for Pulis is that West Brom have all the tools ready for him to use. They’ve shown they can play this way, just without any sort of consistency. Whether that’s a failing on the previous gaffers or on this playing group will be the key to Pulis’s future. The individuals who are vital to making this work for him will be Lescott, Yacob and Berahino up top. Lescott has a great record of playing this style when he was under Moyes at Everton. If Pulis can get him back to that level then he’ll boss this defence and a confident Lescott is a goalscoring Lescott… Think of a Shawcross who plays by the rules… I reckon everyone should be looking at getting a West Brom defender in their wildcard teams, and although he’s a tad more expensive big Joleon could be a great POD (I’ve said that before though and got buuuurrrrnt). Although not fantasy relevant, Yacob is crucial in his deeper role and if he is able to figure out his responsibilities and stick to them, he’s crucial in tightening up this team meaning clean sheets. He’s probably been symptymatic of West Brom these past couple of years, great on their day but unable do it regularly. Clean sheets are fantasy relevant so Yacob fulfilling a role is important. When you play this way you need an X factor in the attacking third. If West Brom can keep Berahino then he is definitely that man! At 5.4m he could be a handy, cheap alternative to allow for Aguero shopping. He’s already got 2 in 2, and after a great run earlier in the season we know he’s got it in him. He fell out of favour with Irvine, and you know he’s replaced the alcohol in his belly with a little fire…

Jonjo Shelvey Award – Scott Arfield. Should be scoring more points than he does if I’m honest. Really decent player but you feel playing for Burnley harms his attacking output. Last goal was the first game of the season… That feels like a million years away.

Jamie Vardy Award – Dwight Gayle. Hasn’t been able to get a decent run at playing regularly at any moment of his EPL career and until he starts stringing starts together never will be relevant. New gaffer in charge may see him given his wings? Could do worse then to keep an eye on him.

My Wildcard is in play… I’ve managed to fit both Aguero and Costa in along with an expensive midfield but I’ve had to take a gamble on the high number of relegation battles in the upcoming 10 weeks and gone super cheap in defence. I needed to take some risks to gain some ground! How are we all going?

73 comments on “Studs Up – GW21”

Forgot to do my lineup and I am bloody devastated. Shit week and lost my fantasy cup game by 3 points, thanks to Dusan Tadic coming on as a sub and scoring ffs. If stupid arse ManU scores 1 goal I go through. Really loathe them even more than normal. Because I forgot to fix my team I left Wisdom and Clyne on my bench. 44 points and dropped below 5,000 in the rankings. Bitterly disappointed.

Had a great week- up to 392 in the world. Putting the C on Alexis was huge and kept me in the Cup. Also had Wisdom on the bench and he came on for Sterling so was stoked with that. Thinking I’ll have to play my WC this week. Might downgrade Sterling to Downing and bring in Baines for Debuchy. I also brought Rooney in for Bony last Gameweek but may do a reshuffle and bring in Costa/Aguero instead. Thoughts on those moves?

I’ve just traded out Sterling, so he’ll go huge this week 🙂 Aguero will be a must have at some stage so anything you need to do to bring him in. Too late and he’ll cost too much, too early and he’ll be eased in and not get the minutes… Prefer him over Costa. Debuchy to Baines seems a bit risky but going against the grain may work perfectly.

Sanchez basically pushed me out of the top 5 which sucks. I think I need a big reshuffle and I have a few key questions,
Is lamela a good gamble?
Costa or Sanchez( I can only afford one and already have hazard)
Di Maria or silva?

Good team, few PODs! The only comment I would make is consider trying to keep enough in the bank just in case you want to go Costa to Aguero? You’re right he might keep getting injured… But he might not? Nice pick up on Gardos… Might try and sneak him in mine 😉

When I averaged Panti to having played a full season he was only a couple of points behind leading Forster in the gkp points, so i’m going with him instead. And in my opinion I think that my midfield combined will get more points than what my team would with Aguero in it almost every week. Plus Kane will be good and always firing for Spurs as their front man.

Great writing Baysise, but I disagree with the horrible Chamakh remark tbh. He hasnt been terrific I know but his whole field coverage, my god. He had a very good work ethic and rate under Warnock and if that persists and improves under Pardew, he will be a fantastic player. As for our play, Pardew is a son of ours and will always have our support behind him and he is very good tactically.

Still cant believe we signed Warnock though, very much a panic signing just to keep the fans under control (turned out the opposite ahaha). He is more of a legendary Championship manager tbh, brings the teams up but should resign straight away to actually let the team have a chance of staying up!

Nonetheless, we were relying to much on Bolasie (but who wouldnt!?) so thats why the play was so much on the wings, but hopefully Pardew has some sort of brain and plays Bannan through the middle, because he is what we need. Sanogo coming through may or may not work out but with Murray back I recon we could hold off for a bit.

😛 Wildcard time is the most stressful, when you have the best resource why not utilize it! 😉

Yeah he aint a top 10 striker, but for someone like us that is what we need, he has a good work ethic so once we go ahead we will track back, you wont see much top team strikers/forwards track back as much as he does especially if they go ahead.

Bolasie comment is spot on, he can be anything but he can’t shoulder the work on his own. Our midfield was very good last week and the last couple of weeks with Jedi, Mcarthur and Ledley playing thorough the middle, but that right wing has been troubling us all season. A couple can play there but not any of them seem to be hitting their strings atm.

Off topic, but is someone able to change the comment settings for the website so we can read full conversation when reading on mobile? Maybe don’t have them one after another, cos after couple replies you get one letter per line and have no idea what anyones saying!

Azpili–> Baines? or Rooney –> Aguero for this week? Funds not an issue. Basically will be using my wild card next week so this more of a one game punt. Have a feeling Aguero will score against Arsenal. Baines playing for a resurgent Everton at home to West Brom is also attractive.

Nice freedom to have! There are cons for both of those trades; Aguero might start form the bench again and West Brom are resurging themselves (see above article). Aguero is the cheapest he’ll be this season though…

Hey Baysie, great article. what are your thoughts on having a punt on Sanogo? signed with palace and should play straight away. I am planning on trading him in for Austin and if it doesn’t work out I’m using my wildcard next week anyway

🙂 That’s fine but you’ll be stuck with him forever. It’s not often you have the chance to trade a sub out… And he started like 1 game this season? The rest looks good, Shawcross, Mata and Pelle are all risks but we can’t go all go the same. Boyd has saved my ass several times this season and is still great value?

Getting a wildcard article written up now as it seems a lot are going for it! Personally happy I held of until international break, not many have taken possible transfers into account. Having said that, I’m not sure Bony is fpl relevant. Aguero is a lock and he will only play when 2 strikers suits. Hopefully some more activity to come!

I like A, but trading Taylor. With Debuchy out for 3 months you’d think Chambers will get all the minutes he can handle. Be wary of Gardos, he probably won’t be a long term plan. Some time in February he’ll go back to the bench.